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DT225, Fuel Issue

gbirth08

New member
After many years of owning this DT225 - 2003 I have never had an issue with it until this past weekend.

Motor always starts right up with no issues what so ever, cold or warmed up. I normally dont even pump the primer bulb on the cold start. This past weekend the first and second runs were fine, the third time after finishing at the fishing spot we had a few hundred yards of no wake zone to go through, about halfway through the engine began to spit and sputter and eventually cut out. I thought hm weird never had this issue before. Pumped the bulb back up firm, started right up and finished our idle over.

After that we fished that area for about 45 minutes, went to go get on pad to leave to the next spot and it did the same thing just this time under load. It spit and sputter but did not quit. Hit the primer bulb (probably 10 times to get it back firm and reprime the system) boat was fine on pad no hiccups. It did this a few more times throughout the day where it would idle fine but trying to get on plane it wouldnt. After repriming as long as the motor stayed on it seemed to be fine the problem only presented itself after motor not running for a period of time.

My initial thought is primer bulb, I do not know how old it is and it is laying flat (just learned that it should be mounted vertical) although i haven't had an issue until now.

My second thought was low pressure fuel pumps (2 of them) not delivering enough fuel to the VST for the electric HP pump to then take over from there, but then i second guess myself due to the fact that once i re-prime the system with the bulb it is all good for as long as I was running the motor which was not super long but long enough it should have starved of fuel again.

This brings me back to just a bad primer bulb, or possibly a partially clogged filter. Air in the fuel system somewhere between LP pumps and tank? which i think would present itself while i was running WOT.

Last bit of info is after i got home i pumped the primer bulb for shits and gigs just until it was firm, it held its firmness for a decent bit. Can a primer bulb issue not present itself until the motor is started and that vacuum then causes one of the valves to malfunction?

I am semi-mechanically inclined but i do have a shelf

Thank you in advance for anyone reading this
 
Sounds like you’re on the right track. If pumping your fuel bulb keeps the engine running then you likely have a fuel starvation issue happening. Those bulbs do go bad. Not knowing how old the fuel bulb is I’d be inclined to replace the bulb and try mounting it vertical or best you can. The internal check valve could be going bad allowing fuel to flow back into the tank. If the fuel lines are original OEM they might be deteriorating internally and sending little chunks into the fuel filter and/or the VST. The pickup tube in the fuel tank could be partially plugged with debris? Tank vent partially plugged? A suggestion I see lots on these forums is to run your engine on a portable fuel tank, if your problem clears on a portable tank then your issue is isolated to your fuel supply, if your issue stays with the portable tank then your issue is downstream of where you tapped into the fuel system.
 
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